Lately - 3/26

This morning, my heart dropped when I took Claire into the bagel shop with me, and she commented "Oooh, windyyy," with a hint of concern in her sweet little two-year-old voice. Of course I immediately wondered if she's was remembering the 130 mph winds that tore through our house. Well, really, she'd only remember the part where we were huddled in the corner as the winds blew by the walk-out basement windows, as neither she nor I actually knew they were tearing through our house and roof as well. Or if she was just being a two-year-old who parrots everything she sees and experiences with her ever-growing vocabulary. I don't remember her ever saying "windy" before although in the past I never would have thought twice about the word. Now, I hear the ever-so-slight howl of the cool March wind outside my window while I'm trying to sleep, and must immediately shut them as the sound sends shivers down my back. I don't need an auditory reminder, I have plenty of other reminders, thankyouverymuch. How I ended up on the side of the bed that's closer to the window was probably not intentional, but I might as well be there. Maybe it wasn't just dumb luck that we got out of harm's way just in the nick of time that night, maybe I am some sort of good luck charm. OK no, that's just crazy talking.

 

Someone from my neighborhood set up a Facebook page for us to join and talk about things. Whether it's contractors, insurance companies, donations, 'our feelings', or reaching out to one another, I'm really glad I found the group. Someone posted about being apprehensive about going back to work (check!), about their heart hurting for their children (CHECK!), about feeling like "the rest of the world" doesn't "get it". I don't mean that in a global sense, obviously, but in an inner-circle sense. Someone said (and I paraphrase): "It bugs me to log on to Facebook and see that people are just going about their lives when I am sitting here dealing with this crap." (Check!) Reading that and all of the other posts has at the very least validated my feelings thus far in this ridiculous experience. Yes, I know, no one got hurt and it's just possessions and material things that were lost. For that, I am beyond grateful. I could sit here sobbing all day with gratitude. Literally. You have no idea. But the fact that no one was physically hurt doesn't take away from the emotional toll this has taken on me. And I say that only as someone who was in their house, within 20 feet of the tornado and witnessed it with my very own eyes as my daughter and my dog lay beneath me. The weight of that experience isn't something that goes away just because we're safe and sound and because several days have passed. Honestly, the stress of dealing with re-building our house and re-buying our material things is only superficial stress, and sometimes I choose to focus on that stress instead of the underlying stress of feeling like I cheated death because that's all my body and mind can handle at the moment... the superficial stress. It sounds dramatic, but I really think there are only a few people in my neighborhood who understand it. I think the tornado only hit about a dozen or two houses (but damaged over 100?), so it's just a small group of us who actually have these feelings of "holy shit, that was fucking terrifying and how am I still alive?"

 

Well, I didn't realize I had so much to say this morning. I'm finding it hard to focus on my work this morning. It all started with just a sweet little voice. "Oooh, windyyy."

You Know You Are... When...

You know you are a mom when...

... you long to go to Target by yourself because then you can actually browse in whatever section you desire for as long as you wish... this sounds like a luxury to me.

 

You know you are not yourself when...

... your husband buys you (unprompted!) a candy bar while at the grocery store, on two separate occasions, yet the both remain uneaten for over a week. This is not me.

 

You know you are a desk monkey when...

... you spend several days outside all day (dealing with tornado-related-crap) and you find yourself EXHAUSTED at 5:00 p.m. from all of that fresh air and sunshine (oh pity me!), only to return to work and sit at a desk staring at a computer for 8 hours and find that the stale office air actually makes you less tired than fresh air and sunshine and even perchance a little more awake and aware. Weird how that works. 

I Continue To Be Alive!

While I was sitting in my driveway, with a blank look on my face, a couple of older adults with Salvation Army aprons on approached me cautiously, asked if I was the homeowner. I acknowledged that I was, and they handed me a single page with a graph on it about the stages of emotions I'll be going through. They explained I was 'here' on the graph, climbing toward a peak, (as the y-axis grows, as do they 'happy feelings'), and that at the top of the peak is the 'grateful' feeling, but that I would soon plummet down toward a horrible valley of anger and desperation. Well, it sounds really dramatic, but I'm pretty sure I'm still in the "well, I'm alive!" category of gratefulness.

Here are some more pictures of my house. I don't know why my house was one of the ones that was focused on, I guess it was on CNN, Weather.com, several Michigan newspapers front pages, Univision (some Spanish station/network? my cousin told me...), etc. I think because the front face of the house is brick and the brick is untouched, it makes the house look stoic or something. The fact that the front is untouched does not reflect what it's like inside.

On my street, we're the 3rd house in, on the right side of the street. On the left side of the street, houses # 1, 2, and 3 are completely demolished. House #1 was leveled by the tornado, House #2 is the same floor plan as our (except not brick) and basically the entire top level of the house was blown off/away, and House #3 (directly across the street from us) is demolished as well.

On my side of the street, House #1, #2, and #3 (us), and #4 are all uninhabitable, will take 4-6 months to gut and rebuild from the inside and outside. But our houses will not be demolished, they will be restored. I'm not sure what's the better scenario, but that's our deal.

So here are some pictures of the house. This is mostly for shock factor, I admit. But it's unbelievable! I'm still slightly in denial!

My bedroom. OK, I won't lie, it didn't look much nicer than this before the tornado... :P
See that bookshelf? That's where my engagement ring was sitting. It was still sitting there when we went up there for the first time. Can you believe that?? The roof was torn off but my ring didn't get picked up. Bizarre.

Our family room

The kitchen eating area. You an see the debris all over the backyard.

Our backyard. The lower level windows on the right... I was sitting about 5 feet from the windows on a couch that faced the windows and about 10 seconds before the tornado came through I ran from the couch to the corner of the basement, then the tornado hit our house and the windows exploded inwards and the railing of those stairs went through the window. You can see the railing still there sticking out of the window on a diagonal.

This is the view from the basement window.

This is our garage. My car was in the garage, the garage door was down when the tornado hit, but was wrapped around the car in the aftermath.

Another shot of the basement, right where I was sitting before it hit. I honestly didn't know what was about to hit.

All boarded up.

I feel a little weird posting pictures of my neighbor's destroyed house. This is the "House #2" across the street from us. They have the same floor plan as us, their entire 2nd floor was blown off. They were out of town when this happened, so thankfully they didn't have to endure the actual tornado. They have a 2 year old as well.

This is House #1 across the street from us. The entire house was leveled by the tornado, so this is post debris-cleanup. I don't know the story behind why this toilet is the only thing left standing? There was an 87 year old man who lived here, his care-taker got him to the basement in time and he walked out of the walk-out basement without a scratch.

Our deck, post debris-cleanup.

Our family room

Family room

Bedroom, this must be after it was boarded up. But before it was cleaned up, obviously!

This one makes me sad. :(  My 2 year old's room. Obviously you can't see much here, it was just really sad to see it.

Across the street neighbor's (House #2) bathtub, with our house in the background. Here you can see the garage wrapped around the car.

OK, almost done with the pics. 

This it the deck chair from across the street House #2, which went through our front window. Nucking futs!

Tornado

Why do I feel the need to blog less than 5 hours after a tornado blew through my house? I don't know. The sirens were going off when I picked up Claire from school, the kids were in the tiny bathroom with the teachers but I decided to go home anyway, living just 1 mile from her daycare.

We went to the basement almost immediately, and I honestly thought it was no big deal. We hung out on the couch right in front of the three windows of our walk-out basement. Claire, who just turned 2 last week, found her bouncy seat which had been retired to the basement, and was laying in it, strapped in. She was just chilling.

All of a sudden, it started blowing something freakish. This is the moment of divinity in which I immediately picked her up in the bouncy seat and ran to the corner of the basement. Granted, in hindsight, I should have moved to another section of the basement, but about 5-10 seconds after we got there, the windows just exploded in and the tornado was passing over my house. I briefly looked over to the window, saw the windows exploding in to the house, saw the scene of Wizard of Oz right before my very fucking eyes. Just gusts and gusts of brown and yellow light and wind and ugliness and neighbors play structures and my deck and god knows what else blowing by those windows. Kind of wish I didn't have a walk-out basement but glad as hell that I had a basement to begin with, and that I was down there.

Just two years ago, right after Claire was born, we got a TON of tornado sirens. Being a new mom, I insisted we all head down there, but on the 3rd or 4th 'false alarm' in a couple of weeks, we started to get jaded by the sirens. I am so, so thankful that I wasn't jaded enough to not be in the basement. I am so, so thankful for the divine message to move to the corner that very second.

I keep playing the What If game and I know it's not healthy. "What if I would have stayed at daycare in that tiny bathroom?" "What if I wouldn't have been in the basement?" "What if I hadn't moved from right in front of the window when I did?"  I can't keep doing that. I didn't stay at daycare. I did go to the basement. I did move to the corner. We escaped without a scratch. My dog is OK. My daughter couldn't have been better. I don't think she saw much, I threw my body over her and I think she was just nervous that I was so scared and crying.

My house? Who knows. Here are some pictures. I was escorted out by firefighters who told me not to go back in the house because it was creaky and they said it was unsafe to be in there. It appears it's not supported on one side where the side of the garage was torn off. That's what insurance is for. All I care about at the moment is that I got to sing ABCs and Jingle Bells and Rock-a-Bye-Baby to my 2 year old while in my parent's car en route to their house. I'm glad that I got to distract her from my distress by showing her the cool firetrucks and by letting her drink Gatorade and hugging her and holding her hand as she fell asleep and that we are 100% healthy. How am I so lucky? To whom do I owe my life - literally - my life. And my daughter's life? And my 14 week old fetus-baby's life? My husband was out of town, on his way up to what was supposed to be a fun weekend of college football watching and beer drinking. Is it funny that while I was sitting in the basement of my torn up house, terrified to move until the hail stopped and until the firefighters broke down my front door (because I wasn't answering the door - uhhh, no, I was crouched in the corner of the basement still, over 2 hours after the tornado hit. I wasn't moving until the firefighter escorted me.)  Anyway, while I was sitting there, thanking Grandpa Ron and Grandma Betty (two of my grandparents who passed away in January and February respectively) for helping to save my life, I felt bad for my husband that he had to come home from his fun weekend. Silly! Of course he's on his way back, but I was like "Awww MAN. Nick was really really looking forward to that."

Goals Revisited

So, I think I was supposed to do something like run 150 miles, eat dessert only 3x in the quarter, and cook vegetarian 3x per week. Going off memory but I'm pretty sure those were the three goals.

I got off to a strong start. I was running a ton, I think I got up to 50 miles logged in the first few weeks. I was feeling great. Then, I took a pregnancy test. Then pregnancy fatigue set it. I won't lie. Those first few weeks, I still worked out and was running at the gym, all smug-like, like "look at me, I'm a pregger running, lame are those who laze about on the couch" and then, two weeks later, foot: meet mouth. I mean, foot, meet head.

When it comes down to it, I blame pregnancy on my failing all three of these goals. I had no energy or mental wherewithal to withstand working out, cooking in general, and who am I kidding. The dessert goal? Was never going to happen, pregnancy or no pregnancy. Why I put that one in there is beyond me. Depriving myself of dessert is just... cruel. Plain and simple.

So, as I sadly wrap up this quarter with a big 0-for-3 record, I guess it's time to (1)  make some minor, baby steps towards healthier living, now that I am feeling better-ish, and (2) start writing my Q2 goals. Yes, even though I had a big fat F on the first go-around, I will still make goals. I think this upcoming quarter it will be about working out (that one's gotta stay - a healthy body makes for a healthy mind) and tidying up my house. Let's just say that my Spring Cleaning 2011 list still has about 90% of the items on it (yes, last year's list) and the list has only grown, so it's time to put on the rubber gloves and get to it. A clean house makes for a happy housewife working mama. (Part-time housewife.)

Ta ta for now.

Two Years Ago Today

My daughter is two today. To say "I love her so much" is the understatement of the year. One of the things that has surprised me the most about parenthood is how the love grows exponentially with time. I'm sure this will taper off at some point, it's not like a 60 year old is just obsessed with their 35 year old child the way a 29 year old is obsessed with her 2 year old daughter. When I was preparing to become a parent, I tried to envision myself as the type of mother who, upon seeing her child for the first time, starts weeping uncontrollably. I just couldn't picture that happening. And it didn't. That's not to say I didn't love her right away, but that's what I mean when I say my love for her has grown exponentially with time.


Two years ago today, at this very hour, I was in the middle of my labor. I had been admitted to the hospital a few hours earlier at 4 cm. Little did I know then that I would only progress 1 cm over the next 8 hours. Typing that out makes me cringe, but in the early part of labor, I was blissfully unaware of my immediate future. A future that involved 8 hours of little progression! But eventually, my body kicked it into gear naturally, just the way I wanted it to, and I became a mom. Typing it out doesn't really give gravity to the importance of this event, but I won't even try to pepper it with words that can't do it justice. I didn't cry like a baby when I first became a mom, but I sure as hell could cry at the drop of a hat reflecting on the last two years of my life with Claire, and Nick.

And to think I get to do it all over again.
 
Lucky, lucky, lucky.

SMART Goals

OK, I'm a bit late to the resolution game, but whatever. It's never too late to start resolutions. Rather than the cliche ones I typically promise myself to do, I am going to try to make SMART resolutions. By SMART, I'm not being emphatic... I'm using the workplace acronym!

 

Specific

Measurable

Attainable

Realistic

Timely

 

And I'm thinking I want to do a theme for goals this year. There are a few areas of my life that can use improving, so why not try to actually focus on them for once! Novel idea!

 

Q1 - all about health

Q2 - all about learning

Q3 - all about friendship

Q4 - all about health (Pt. 2)

 

Q1 - January - March goals:

• Exercise: I'd like to get back into jogging. In this time frame (91 total days, and we're already on day 9), I'd like to jog 150 miles. Where did that number come from? I figured I can run 1.5 miles a day if I really wanted to. In fact, that's a pretty attainable goal! Realistically, I won't run every day. Every other day is more like it. So that's 3 miles every other day. I multiplied 91 days * 1.5 miles per day, and came up with 136.5. Then, I just bumped it up to 150 miles, because 136.5 isn't a  nice "clean" number. Now, since I'm starting this late (and haven't jogged this year yet), I actually have 83 days to work toward this goal, which comes out to 1.8 miles per day, or 3.6 miles every other day. I guess I better get going!
• Caveat - I'll allow myself to walk at 4 miles per hour if snow or injury gets in the way
• Food: I'm going to cook vegetarian for lunch and dinner 3x per week, including weekends. If I can, I will exceed this goal.
• Note: I understand that just because it's vegetarian, doesn't necessarily mean it's healthier than meat-based dishes.
• Caveat - I may use chicken broth in soups. This is my resolution list, so even that technically isn't vegetarian, I don't care!
• Desserts: I have a gigantic sweet tooth. Thanksgiving/Christmas notwithstanding, I have been pretty good about not binging on desserts. I'd like to keep on that trend. I'm going to allow myself desserts for the following, plus three "free passes" to have a dessert other nights (presumably, once per month): co-worker's baby shower, Valentine's date w/Nick, brother's birthday, Claire's birthday, my birthday. OK, that's a lot, yes. So maybe I won't need my three free passes!

I think all of these goals are specific (uhhh, don't think I could be any more specific really), measurable (ditto), attainable (with a little willpower and a little sweating - sure!), realistic (sigh... "yes, I can fit in a 20 minute run into my schedule" says my lazy self), and timely. Only looking out 3 months is good for me, as I can't really be "big picture" for this kind of thing.

 

As far as Q2-Q4, well, those I will defer to a later date. Like I said, I can't really think big picture at the moment. And I may decide to go another route anyway, so I'm going to be flexible with myself. I've loved reading other blogger's posts about resolutions and it got me motivated to make some for myself as well.

 

I'm a Cooking Fool

I don't know WHAT has come over me. I'm pretty sure it's the Internet's fault. I... am an addict. I am a cooking-food-then-freezing-it addict.

Why is this the internet's fault? you may say. Surely the internet isn't holding a gun to your head, telling you to don an apron and wax culinary in the kitchen.

No, no it's not. Although that would make for an interesting story to tell at parties! "Then, when the gun was at my head, I started getting flashbacks of all of the highlights of my life... like it was passing right before my eyes. Memories of that turkey tetrazinni, or the cilantro lime rice & beans, or the dreamy pumpkin black bean soup..." and people would cock their heads in a slightly canine way, grasping at straws at what exactly to add to this very sorry conversation, as clearly they do not know how to communicate with a strange woman who dreams of dinners.

Uh, where was I?

I blame Pinterest.

I don't even HAVE a Pinterest. I don't Pinterest. I am not Pinteresting. (Nor am I interesting, apparently. See: This Blog.)

BUT! I read a ton of blogs. And I'm catching on to the general consensus that Pinterest is The Shit. And knowing the general gist of people (being that when we all love something we want to shout from the rooftops) I have noticed that it turns out that I DO Pinterest because people post blogs, tweets, facebook posts about their Pinterestsessss'. (<---- I'm annoying.)

So, since I read blogs and tweets and whatnot, I, indirectly, read Pinterest. Or whatever adjective/verb/adverb/noun I'm supposed to use. I am Pinterestingly Pinterstable.

So this has affect a few things: my grocery shopping, my freezer space, and my dishwashing load.

Grocery shopping, I don't mind. In fact? I actually love to grocery shop, as long as she* isn't with me. She** does not do well at the grocery store. She*** makes me taker her out of the cart and carry her, while I push the cart one-handed and sweat profusely, not because it's hard manual work, but because I instantly fear that other people in the grocery store are judging me for letting my 1 year old rule my every move, and also judge me for being annoying and running into their carts, or offending their ears when she**** inevitably starts to whine because really, what 1 year old likes to grocery shop? Except when we stop to look at the 56,895 gold fish crammed into those tiny tanks in the pet area, then she***** looooooves to grocery shop. Or when we fiiiinally get to Penny the Pony (who is truly named Sandy the Pony, but she only costs 1 cent to ride, so I assumed her name was Penny until I saw the name Sandy painted on the bottom of the pony, but still in my head think "Let's go ride Penny! Shoot! No, Sandy!") at the very end of the shopping trip, then she****** reeeeaaaalllllllly goes bananas for grocery shopping.

Uhhh... where was I? (Again?)

My grocery list grows exponentially with the number of decadent recipes I ogle over on the Internet. Like I said, this part I actually like.

Then, my freezer space. See, I want to make like 10 recipes a week, which is just plain old dumb for 2.5 people. I probably only need to make 3, 4 tops, as leftovers and PB&J can sustain us for the rest of the days in the week. Except, what ends up happening is I make dinner, then.... I SHIT YOU NOT.... I make another dinner, JUST TO FREEZE. ALL BECAUSE OF PINTEREST!!

My freezer is like a fat guy in a little coat. You know what I mean? It's busting at the seams, barely closing, I have virtually every one of my tupperware containers taken up by a frozen block of soup/casserole/side dish in my freezer. Oh, plus a turkey from Christmas 2010 from Nick's work. (Side note: I find it very bizarre that employers hand out frozen birds to people for Christmas? What if we were vegetarian, or ate only organic? Am I being picky?)

Lastly, with twice the amount of cooking, that's twice the amount of dishwashing. My hands are pretty much pruny, even in the middle of the day when I haven't scrubbed a dish in 18 hours. Lotion application is near hourly due to the dry skin caused by the constant nightly dishwashing. I'm about thisclose from investing in Burt's Bees, is what I'm saying. You should too.

So... anyone know if Intervention is still casting?


And now, for the * post scripts (aka "how cute is my kid"):

(Twenty minutes later...) Oh shoot, nevermind. Cannot for the everloving life of me find my flip cam, which is my only means for getting my pics off my camera and onto the computer. I'm so, like, 2004 when it comes to technology.

Instead, here's an oldie but goodie:

Nine to Five

I read a ton of blogs, most of them of the Mommy-Blog variety. And most of them of the Stay-At-Home-Mom variety. So I have heard the cries and the pleas and the intelligent discussions about why staying at home is a real job, a thankless job, a job that is taken for granted and pays zero. I am honestly, truly, hand-on-my-heart saying "I hear you" and I don't judge anyone for anything they choose to do with their time, especially when it comes to children.

And while I don't want to play the "who has it worse" game, I have to vent for a bit.

I'm a working mom. All throughout my pregnancy, I had every intention of going back to work after having my daughter, and I did so, just as planned. But I never imagined that I would feel so torn about it, not right away, but 12, 18, 21 months down the road. Being a working mom is hard. Not the same kind of hard as stay-at-home parenthood, but the kind of hard that is like this:
 - You sometimes have to wake your sleeping child to get ready in the morning. She can't just wake up on her own time, she has to wake up NOW because the clock is ticking and I've got to get to work.
 - Sometimes she'll ask to have her bottle on the couch, but you don't have time for that, and multi-task by giving her a bottle while you change her morning diaper and put on her clothes for the day.
 - You'd like to slowly take her to daycare, linger around for a few minutes to get her acclimated and settled, but the longer you spend at drop-off, the later you get to work, and the later you leave to pick her up. You're just buying time from the evening if you dawdle in the morning.
 - When you finally leave work at 5:00 p.m. and think to yourself "Ugh... what a long day", you realize that your kid was at a daycare facility with other people who are not YOU all day, and that she doesn't even spend the majority of her time with you, but with other people.
 - THEN, when you finally get home at 5:30, it's time to make dinner - and if you have mom-guilt like I do, you'll want to make something from scratch (avoiding processed foods is a big mom-guilt thing for me), but sometimes you'll just give in and let her eat sugar or whatever her vice may be, just to make her happy.
 - Then it's time for a bath, an evening bottle, a few books, and that's a wrap folks.

You basically get about 20-30 minutes of free time with your kid a day.

No, nothing about my day is physically draining, I'm not running around all day after little people, constantly changing diapers, feeding, teaching, interacting... all of which I imagine are very draining. But on the flip side, I spend 30 minutes of quality time with my daughter a day. THAT is hard for me to swallow.

So I guess I meant to write this as a "we all have it hard, ladies" post, but I think it just ended up being a raging mama-guilt, now-I-have-a-lump-in-my-throat, I-need-to-go-have-a-cry post.

The hardest part is that there is no right answer. Stay at home parenthood is awesome in that YOU and you alone get to raise your child. But it can lead to (I'm totally guessing what would happen in MY situation) boredom, loneliness, and loss of income. The last one is a tricky one, because I don't want money to be the only reason I'm not a SAHM. But the reality is that employment is scarce, money doesn't grow on trees, and providing for a family isn't cheap. Working parenthood is also awesome in some regards because I am contributing to my family financially, maintaining some sense of professional self, and doing things I enjoy and that keep me learning and contributing.

So there isn't really a great way to end this post. I didn't have any magical lightbulb moments while writing this, although I do feel a little better getting it off my chest.

So I'll end this with a picture of Claire vising with Santa, who is actually a co-worker who plays the part of the jolly old guy each year, so us working parents can avoid the whole mall scene. (ONE perk of being a working parent...? That's a stretch.) Ho ho ho!

Pictures (Alternate Title: When Words Take Too Long)

My baby toddler still fits in her Moby wrap! Kills mama's back but whatever!

Claire loves bath time. Also, she loves looking at herself in the mirror. She's so vain.

Obligatory trip to the pumpkin patch! We went with our friends Jackie and Gracie. :)

The lens was blurry because it was really humid in the butterfly house. I wasn't trying to be artsy-fartsy with filters or anything! This is on Mackinac Island. Claire's first trip on a boat.

Heaven forbid any sand gets on her while playing in the sandbox.

When left to pick out her own clothes... oh, and if she picks out her own toys, she's likely to play with deflated balls (no jokes) and tupperware. Like every other kid with a household of plastic crap.

Question: Am I going to like this?
Answer: I'll give you two guesses, and the first one doesn't count.

I like this one very well. Send candy. I haz suger. More more peez.

Daddy is a household favorite as he is the candy giver-outer.

Gah! You had to see the cute little stinger!

Markering in the summertime. A favorite pasttime.

Unimpressed by the 4-H rabbits.

That's it for now. Maybe one of these days I'll write down some actual words. Or, maybe not!